"The Haunted Guitar" was the first out of ten short stories featured in the book, More & More Tales to Give You Goosebumps.
Plot
The story stars a very lazy boy, Jeffrey. Very lazy to the point he once tried to weed the lawn using a vacuum cleaner, instead of proper tools. One day, he and his friend Beth come across a music store that recently caught fire about ten minutes prior to them walking near it. They walk in through the ashes to steal one of the guitars that was left in suitable condition.
The reason being that Jeffrey's father is also very lazy and he has yet to fulfill the promise to buy Jeffrey a guitar. So, he thinks it is perfectly fine to just come by and steal an old one anyway. Though the fact it was not damaged in the wild fire does not seem to don on him...
He takes it home and wakes that night to the sight of an old black man inside his bedroom! The man is playing the guitar and explains that he is the ghost of an old blues musician named Memphis Willy. Willy explains that he can't ever stop playing the guitar and wonders if Jeffrey would like to learn how to play the blues.
Jeffrey agrees and Memphis Willy starts to teach him how to play. Guiding the young boys fingers across each guitar string, until he agrees to be Memphis Willy's terrestrial partner. But when Jeffrey tries to stop playing, he learns that no one leaves the stage of the living without playing the blues... for life.
Jeffrey can't stop his fingers from playing the blues and his fingers start to blister and bleed. His father rushes into the bedroom and tells his son that it is really super that he learned how to play on his own.... Because now he does not have to pay for lessons.